Electronic music promotion, ARTIST REPRESENTATION & LABEL MANAGEMENT

Captain P aka Fred P - Escapism (Soul People Music)

Tracklist:A1 Entry PointA2 These Times ft. Lady BlacktronikaA3 NYCB1 All I Want To SayB2 Get ReadyC1 Way Of The VibeC2 Social Media D1 Light UpD2 21 Century ArtistD3 EscapismD4 To Be Continued

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Fred Peterkin's second album under his Captain P guise lands on his Soul People Music imprint in March 2017. 'Escapism' draws on many themes and inspirations from Peterkin's life as a touring artist and citizen of the world.

Imbuing his trademark deepness with moments of sound collage drawn from field recordings while on the road, Peterkin's seventh full-length album is one of the most personal and stylistically varied records in his discography. An accompanying short film, also titled 'Escapism', which will provide further context to the project's themes, will debut upon the album's release.

Overmono - Arla II (XL Recordings)

Overmono return to XL Recordings with their second EP on 10th March 2017. Arla II is the follow up to last year's debut Arla EP and further crystallizes the duo's immense & innovative sound. This latest 6-tracker from Ed & Tom Russell (known respectively for their solo Tessela and Truss projects) carries things forward from its predecessor in underscoring Overmono as a fully formed & ongoing project.

Instead of searching for commonalities between their earlier individual work, Overmono combines the Russells' artistic talents in order to reach the spaces between ambient, techno & UK hardcore dynamics that few current acts are capable of reaching. Born of the brothers' collective creative impulse and staking out its own defined place in the contemporary landscape of electronic music, Overmono are firmly amongst those pushing the form into new and exciting places.

All of this is now also being explored in a live setting. Having made their debut at Krakow's experimental electronic music festival, Unsound in October 2016, Overmono will be performing a number of live and DJ dates throughout 2017.

DJ Bone's first album under his Differ-Ent alias will arrive on Don't Be Afraid in February 2017

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DJ Bone is Differ-Ent.

But then again, he always has been. A pioneer DJ and producer hailing from Detroit, whose technical skills are perhaps only equalled by the upper echelons of the city’s most advanced techno trailblazers, he’s nonetheless forged a path only of his own. Eschewing commercial expectations, scene pressures and anything other than his own exquisite taste, Bone has earned a vital, dedicated audience while remaining comfortably and individually underground.

Despite his stellar reputation, Bone’s recent studio activities have steered him towards a new, altogether more personal direction. In late 2015, Differ-Ent's arrival on Don’t Be Afraid with the 'Differ-Ent(Hrall)' EP paved the way for its follow-up, 'M.O.M.:' both were forceful slabs of psychedelic outsider techno, with the latter taking on a tangible emotional resonance as it honoured the memory of Bone's late mother. 'M.O.M.' quickly became one of the label’s best celebrated and widely played releases. Bone, typically self-sufficient and known to turn down remixes for huge clubbing brands, was impressed by the Bristol label’s honesty and persistence. As he continued to rock parties internationally, Bone set to work on an LP embracing his deeper, darker and more cerebral side.

Not that ‘It’s Good To Be Differ-Ent has found Bone veering away from the dancefloor. “It’s like, the natural vibe for me is always going to be funky”, admits Bone. “It’s going to swing, it’s going to have that element of soul. But the Differ-Ent vibe is almost angrier. Determined, perhaps is a better word. I would typically just go to the studio when I had an idea. To the point where I say, 'OK, I’m going to do something, I’m going to make it happen.' But the process for Differ-Ent...it’s kinda methodical. It’s borderline predictable. But the thing that makes it Different is that it could go any which way at any given time. And it can be harder edged usually, or it can go in a soundtrack direction.”

Film plays a significant influence on the landscape of Differ-Ent, with the record’s more melodic flourishes sometimes designed to evoke the doubtlessly imaginative chase sequences swimming around Bone’s mind. If Bone’s usual movements are ‘Do The Right Thing’, his Spike Lee joint, then in his own words, ‘It’s Good To Be Differ-Ent’ is his tribute to Paul Verhoven’s 'RoboCop'.

“The only way I think the album evolved differently was the electro stuff”, recalls Bone. “I was excited about that. Because that was a different type of electro as well. It wasn’t a normal, 80s funk kinda electro. It completely separates you. It’s still for the dancefloor, but it’s almost as if it shakes you to dance, rather than coaxes you.”

‘It’s Good To Be Differ-Ent’ certainly feels powerful, mastering a mix of Drexicyan tones and drums that align more with a newer wave of house and techno experimentalists. Many of these, from Hodge to Ø/Phase, have been an influence on Differ-Ent, all sharing what Bone describes as a unique affinity with “creepy shit.” It’s his thunderous, occasionally paranoid but overwhelmingly positive contribution to a forward thinking European scene he has come to relate to on a par with his native Detroit.

Much of ‘'It’s Good To Be Differ-Ent’ has been inspired by Bone’s frustration. Frustration with the modern political system as well as the creative conservatism of his own scene. In the studio, he has created a unique riposte. But the commercial pressure Bone has always avoided is only growing stronger. Is it harder than ever to be truly different?

“It’s harder for the majority of people”, observes Bone. “For me, it’s really easy. I’ve been preparing myself for this for years."

Artwork by OptigramMastered by Lawrie at CurvedAlbum text by John Thorp

Studio OST - Eventide / Ascension (Lustwerk Music)

White Material crew's Galcher Lustwerk and Alvin Aronson return under the guise of Studio OST with a 4-track EP of live jams on Lustwerk Music. While the pair's critically acclaimed 2016 debut 'Scenes (2012-2015)' leaned towards home listening, 'Eventide / Ascension' shifts the focus back to the dancefloor with two chugging cinematic house tracks. 'Eventide' is an evolving nebula of fluttering pads and lush percussion, while 'Ascension''s hot-electric drums are complimented by sharp synth chords that unfurl into controlled chaos. A beatless version of 'Eventide' and a drums only version of 'Ascension' sweeten the deal.

Dial co-founder David Lieske's first Carsten Jost album since 2000 arrives in February

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In the midst of a busy year, full of wildly-varied accomplishments, David Lieske (aka Carsten Jost) has surprised us all with an unannounced 11-track full-length album on Dial - his first since 2000’s “You Don’t Need A Weatherman...” In the interim he’s kept busy curating countless releases on Dial, the label he co-runs with Peter “Lawrence” Kersten; celebrated a 15 year label anniversary with an all-encompassing 2LP/various artists’ compilation; released a gallery-edition album of his black ambient collaboration Misanthrope CA with Robert Kulisek, “Deathbridge"; and launched a new magazine project (also with Kulisek) named after the speed of light i.e. “299792458m/s”. All this activity, even after his recent transatlantic relocation from Berlin to New York City, mainly to open the American branch of Mathew Gallery has surely taken us all by welcome surprise.

Out of all of the Dial house and techno artists, Carsten Jost has always represented the most precise brand of exquisitely doom-laden house, laced with equally strong doses of melancholy and beauty. Here on “Perishable Tactics”, Lieske runs through his distinctively stealthy low-slung beat-mospheres, leaning towards a decidedly low-lit and sultry space, but mixed with a fresh, gently arc-ing feeling of romance and dare I say it?—Love(?) Tellingly he’s seen it fit to include 2007’s “Love”-one of his best e.p. tracks from a split release with Efdemin. But while “Love” represents a climbing and yearning towards a place where love might reside, the remaining new tracks debuting here seem to represent a place where this love actually exists. This feeling is woven into his deep, medium tempo, detroit-inflected house rhythms, accented with crystalline keys, disembodied voices at times and gently soaring strings. While anger may be less in the forefront here it is important to notice that these tracks are ripe with the balance of joy and unease inherent in house. There is definitely a newfound languidity here that feels particularly like a moment shared by two (perhaps amongst many) but the atmosphere still remains decidedly pensive. See “Ambush” with it’s strolling beat, moody yet sweet chords and chilling atmosphere later joined by thunder cracking in an almost-approving-manner a safe-distance away.

Of course diehard fans will find satisfaction knowing that Lieske’s delectable angst hasn’t completely abated. Title track “Perishable Tactics” takes a disarmingly peaceful setting and rolls a heavy fog over it to herald a sure-to-arrive fate that awaits us all. (See also “Army Green”.). But with “Dawn Patrol" the whispering hi-hat and gently clanking rhythm offset by rolling strings marries the old and new Carsten Jost most successfully. All of this atmosphere bookended by ambient intro and outro tracks by Misanthrope CA make for a perfectly foreboding, elegant and deliciously dark new album release by Carsten Jost.

The eye of the storm: welcome to Tornado Wallace's debut album! The accumulation of about four years of work, with tracks written in Berlin and Melbourne, 'Lonely Planet' is nothing like you may have expected from the Australian expat. No stranger to fans and followers of ESP Institute, Beats in Space and Music From Memory's sister Label Second Circle, Tornado Wallace's strain of releases so far merged functionality with a musical playfulness that led him to find himself as one of the producer's behind José Padilla's International Feel album. Here, he leaves the needs of the dance floor behind in order to create a magical mystery tour de trance into his and our inner jungle.

How about some references? New Age sounds meet new wave melodies, Grace Jones runs into the Dire Straits at Compass Point, while a Korg Mini Pops and a Roland CR78 make amends for Sly & Robbie's absence, Michael Mann pictures Joseph Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness', Robert Rauschenberg tries his luck at naturalism and an imagined Wally Badarou echoes through all of it.

Sandwiched between the title track and the yearning beauty of the album's final point 'Healing Feeling', you get all of that as well as collaborations with and contributions of NO ZU, David Hischfelder and the voice of Sui Zhen on 'Today', who would easily make Anna Domino take her proverbial hat off.

Tornado Wallace created an album that supersedes the requirements and expectations of a debut. Like a lost Island Records or a never released Made to Measure album, 'Lonely Planet' soundtracks notions and ideas that recall the nostalgic future in the past as much as it looks ahead.

rRoxymore - Organ Smith (Don't Be Afraid)

Tracklist:A1. Organ SmithB1. About Finding The Right BalanceB2. Uchi’s House

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rRoxymore arrives with her debut DBA release, with a three-track EP of her intriguing, one-off blend of contrasting textures – organic and synthetic, icy and warm – a fresh step in dance music. Real name Hermione Frank, the French musician and producer has a long history making music in various ways, with various people, before settling in Berlin and concentrating on the solo project that refines it all.

As rRoxymore, she released her epic 10-minute debut “Wheel of Fortune” in the summer of 2012 – half of split a 12” with Planningtorock on the latter’s own Human Level label. Human Level also provided the outlet for rRoxymore’s first EP, Precarious/Precious, the following year. The four tracks combined nervous grooves, bewitching cosmic synths, twisted snippets of acoustic instruments and other intriguing sounds. Live, rRoxymore creates rhythms and sounds with energetic rawness merging with a stirring psychedelia, taking you into a new world.

The Tiger is back – finally on full length again! The second studio album for Tiger & Woods not only marks a desired return to a specific format, but is also a huge leap forward in their area of expertise: their brand of fun and functional dance music gets broadened by influences from electronica, italo disco and uptempo house, while keeping a groove that is distinctly linked to what some people refer to as boogie.

After travelling the world from left to right and from top to bottom with a live-set to boot and skilful DJ sets that resemble that genre melting approach, “On The Green Again” is the result of spending valuable studio time at the “Tiger's Lair” – a carefully-built new work place that plays its own part in the creative process of one of the most prolific production teams of our days, while simultaneously starting T&W Records for all sorts of adventures that are linked to Tiger & Woods, but not narrowed to a specific sound. See “Unleashed Tapes Vol. 1” for further reference. A double A-sided 12-inch that owes as much to disco as an influence as it pays homage to the funkier and brighter sides of house and techno.

Honing a craft that is rooted in edit culture as an ethos, but has since long left that bumpy road dependable on samples and their clearance, T&W make “On The Green Again” work as the second album that defies the difficulty usually attached to such ventures. 10 brand-new tracks (and three previously released bonus tracks on the CD version) make up the course between peak-time prime cuts similar to “RockMeLoveMe” or “Come And Get My Lovin” and an almost heart-aching track like “Endless Affair”.Mixed with bits and pieces in-between and neatly placed between a classic intro and outro segment, those tracks are testament to that aforementioned wider scope.

To put it in a nutshell, “On The Green Again” is not concerned with leaving a comfort zone, but with making you comfortable no matter which zone you are in. The only mystery that is left now, is how long we have to wait for the third one.

Deepblak's Chief Alchemist AYBEE will release his fourth full-length studio album, The Odyssey, in November 2016. As befitting its grand title, this newest long-player finds him concerned with personal journeys: both the personal one that has brought him to this point - living in Berlin, 15 years since founding Deepblak in his native Oakland - and the one that beckons for him personally and creatively in future: AYBEE sees himself as being halfway up a mountain, looking back on where he has come from, and to where he will be headed next - both concepts play a profound role in the emotional textures of the album, which in true Deepblak fashion draws from jazz, deep house, techno, hip hop, blues, experimentation, cinema, space, time and infinity.

The Odyssey represents a change-up for AYBEE in several ways, forged from a desire to keep expectations at bay and throw something of a curveball for those who felt they had him pegged: "a good pitcher always keeps you off balance". This newest work saw him deliberately limit his sound palette in a creative exercise that challenged him to create a full body of work from a small pre-selected library of sonic elements. While this was restricting in some aspects, the approach to - as he puts it - "throw the ingredients in a basket and cook with it later" gave him more freedom to focus on atmosphere and groove instead of putting hours into trying out different options - "otherwise I'd still be in the studio now trying to work out which hi-hat to use on the third track!"

While the resulting collection of tracks, bound together in sounds used yet disparate in their applications of them, may represent a more accessible AYBEE album than those prior, it still contains within it the DNA of his work with Deepblak Rhythm Czar, Afrikan Sciences - most notably in their improvised, one-take album length Miles Davis homage 'Sketches of Space'. That 2014 LP was closely followed by another collaboration, with Jerome Sydenham and Ron Trent as S.A.T., released on the former's Ibadan Records and pursuing a more techno-driven sound to the polyrhythmic jazz experimentation of 'Sketches'. Elements of both styles can be found in The Odyssey, as it moves through tempos and styles, yet the approach he has taken regarding the sounds used ensures it will forever be a unique work in his discography - quite literally nothing in his work before or since will sound like this record.

The Odyssey's artwork is by the artist Grzegorz Redko (www.grzegorzredko.com), whose animations of the cover art will be released online ahead of the album release, lending another dimension to AYBEE's latest statement of artistic intent, with many more still to come as he keeps climbing that mountain.

In times where a compilation of 12-inch bangers passes as an album, Telephones “Vibe Telemetry” opts for a different approach. Without being a departure from his 12”s for Sex Tags Ufo, Full Pupp and yours truly or his brilliant remix work for José Padilla and Vangelis Katsoulis, the Norwegian producer from Bergen who calls Berlin his home, hones sound, skills and aesthetics on his debut long-player.

“Vibe Telemetry” is inspired by the pure feeling of listening to house, disco and techno, prior to knowing what it actually was: ambiguous, euphoric, mystical and melancholic. Sonic and physical experiences, which names and origins were yet to be discovered.

The source of “Vibe Telemetry” is that special feeling and much more: borrowed cassette tapes, music recorded from radio, mixes from local Bergen-artists and clubs, tracks heard from the sidewalk outside of clubs you're too young to get into, music from the local music library in Bergen or the things being played in local record-shops.

In essence, Telephones made a record inspired by Norwegian music, it's scene around the turn of the century and the roots of contemporary disco music, which includes almost everything from NY disco to techno and Mad Mike UR productions. The echoes of Italo house and UK labels like Peacefrog, Ferox or Discfunction are as perceptible as the philosophy of fellow Norwegians Bjørn Torske and the late Erot.

It's also a very personal record. Stimulated by the surroundings of a young Telephones growing up on the island of Sotra, outside of Bergen. Taking busses, boats and trains to get around and into the city. The sounds of the ferry mixed with seagulls and hex-programming on PC-software. Old memories of rainy raves on the mountains of Bergen join new field recordings from Mexico, Ibiza, Italy and Norway. Different UK backyards meet sounds from Croatia or Berlin and old recordings from as far back as 1998.

On paper, all of that might sound like a nostalgic record, but it is far from it. “Vibe Telemetry” is made for the future with the past and present in mind. Listen and you will understand.

Kxngs - Earth Sign (Ex-Local)

Nascent London label Ex-Local announces its arrival with a new 5-track EP from South London talent Kxngs. With an extensive back catalogue that includes a release on the LA collective Soulection's imprint (as Kings in 2012) - as well as self-released albums & EPs that can all be found on his Bandcamp (https://kxngs.bandcamp.com) - the 25-year-old Brixton resident has been winning admirers on his own terms ever since a degree in Sound Arts at the University Of The Arts London offered him an escape from a year living homeless on the city's streets.

The scope of Kxngs work on this EP draws on his global travels, particularly to Africa, as well as Deepak Chopra's ‘The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success’ - a book that Kxngs cites as having helped him "gain enlightenment and self-awareness, helping to not only focus on everyday life but also my creativity". The Earth Sign EP draws on Afrobeat, Kuduro, Hip-Hop, Trap and further influences from South America and the Middle East. This passion for exploring world cultures and to base his musical projects on his experiences with them informs all his work, and through basing his musical themes on different areas of the world Kxngs seeks to manifest his dreams and become author of his own story.

Earth Signs will be the first release on Ex-Local - a new label born out of the North London party that has hosted DJs including Jamie XX, Mssingno, Frank Tope and Bala Club. With a core of local artists who became returning favourites that regularly had sweat pouring from the party's ceilings, the next logical step was to start a label to help bring this young, exciting & creatively adventurous new talent to wider recognition. First stop, Kxngs.

Quavius is a producer and rapper from the southern United States. Born in the late 80s with family in the military, he's bounced between Virginia and Florida, soaking in regional go-go and baltimore club music along with rap, R&B, jazz and Drum n' Bass. After some years experimenting behind the DAW, he's amassed a diverse catalog of tunes, 8 of which are featured on his debut self-titled 12" for Lustwerk Music.

Energetic deep house, two-stepping astral funk, crispy cloud raps and cascading rollerskate riffs occupy this all-encompassing EP. Quavius manipulates samples like watercolors, letting bitrates blend and snap into euphoric moments of clarity. His rapping is that of a shapeshifter, making room in the mix any way he sees fit, high, low, melodic or not. And the lyrics? Catchy, life-affirming, fun. What more could you ask for?

See that man on a far off hill, working his dog while attempting to find shelter from the howling wind and driving rain? That’s the Crooked Man, the very antithesis of the modern dance music producer. He lives a simple life, dragging his world‐weary soul across the moors in an endless bid to escape the fallout from 30 years spent at the forefront of Sheffield’s electronic music scene. Once regarded as one of the Steel City’s greatest selectors, he now admits to being gripped by fear at the idea of DJing, and refuses to spend any time in nightclubs.

He may be ill at ease with the darkroom throb of 21st century clubs, but the house music the Crooked Man produces is as weighty, alien, raw and left of‐centre as anything you’d get from many a hyped young producer. He’s assisted in his studio endeavours by two other Sheffield survivors: former Clock DVA man Michael Ward, and David Lewin, once the other half of Bleep & Booster with former ABC and Vice Versa man Stephen Singleton.

The Crooked Man’s music blends wonky electronic rhythms, heavy bass and razor sharp, politically aware lyrics, often delivered by the honeyed tonsils of Pete Simpson. For proof, check out the banker‐baiting “Scum (Always Rises The Top)”, or the bittersweet social commentary of “Fools & Fanatics”. The Crooked Man may be world weary, but he’s still brimming with rage. Few could have foreseen a link between this jaded recluse and New York’s militantly forward‐looking DFA Records. But then again, the Crooked Man does have history.

Raised a farm boy, his life changed when he first heard the industrial funk and futurist electronic pop of local bands Cabaret Voltaire and the Human League. Bored of having no decent parties to go to, he became DJ Parrot and began promoting the soon to be legendary Jive Turkey events in 1985. Alongside his DJ partner Winston Hazel, he united Sheffield’s disparate dancers by joining the dots between Northern Soul, disco, hip‐hop, electro and the emerging underground dance sounds of Chicago, Detroit and New York.

In 1987, an early foray into music production accidentally created a hit record, the major label‐signed “Hustle (To The Music)” by Funky Worm. The commercial desires of a large, conservative label proved hugely frustrating, and he soon yearned to break free and head back underground. Salvation came from within Sheffield, with the launch of Warp Records. He teamed up with Cabaret Voltaire’s Richard H Kirk under the Sweet Exorcist alias, delivering the peerless “Testone” in 1990, one of the landmark records of the bleep era. The pair went on to release the first album on Warp, C.C.E.P., in 1991.

Many records under different aliases followed, for both independent and major labels, before Parrot once again found himself chart‐bound as part of eccentric Steel City trio All Seeing I. Their debut album, 1999’s Pickled Eggs & Sherbet, featured contributions from some of Sheffield’s finest, including Jarvis Cocker and The Human League’s Phil Oakey.

Since then, Parrot has kept a low profile. When not working his sheepdogs, he’s quietly produced for Roisin Murphy, Add N To (X), Richard Hawley and Toddla T, amongst others. His decision, some years back, to revisit his love of raw, bass‐heavy house music merely marks another twist in the winding path of the Crooked Man.

Hamburg producer Benjamin Brunn's follow up to his highly-regarded 'A Sun Life' album on Third Ear is like it's predecessor once again bursting with fat, glistening, gorgeous sounds. Brunn's sound is instantly recognizable, made exclusively with the Nord Modular synth and Roland 808 which feature on all his records & live performances. Yet on the Plastic Album's eight tracks he's sounding as fresh, enigmatic and soulful as ever. The album comes in digital format and a special 2x12” vinyl package comprised of clear plastic records in a clear plastic gatefold sleeve.

Mastered by Pole at Scape Mastering BerlinDistribution by Clone

Karen Gwyer - Prophase Metaphase Anaphase Telophase (Don't Be Afraid)

Karen Gwyer joins DBA for an exercise in futurist dancefloor electronics after a recent outing on Alien Jams alongside Beatrice Dillon and last year’s barnstorming Nous release. The US-born Londoner brings the sound of her stomping, analogue live performances closer to the psychedelic, thickly melodic tone of her studio compositions across three tracks, with Prophase Metaphase Anaphase Telophase an obvious choice for DJs.

Following early feet-finding yet highly acclaimed releases on Patten’s Kaleidoscope label and No Pain In Pop, Gwyer has gone on to solidify her place in the quasi-underground techno scene with more acclaimed recordings on labels such as Nous Disques, Alien Jams and Opal Tapes, for which she toured twice. She has also produced remixes for the likes of Nous, Warp, Software and Public Information, and created a number of commissioned pieces for Open Music Archive.

For the past seven years Kornél Kovács has been busy rocking dance-floors and boomboxes worldwide as one third of Stockholm’s Studio Barnhus alongside Axel Boman and Petter Nordkvist. The label and DJ trio is spearheading a new era of fearless Swedish off-centre dance music, straddling the line between cute and menacing.

Anticipation for Kovács' debut album has been rocketing following stand out releases like 2014's wistful Szikra, last year’s mad party anthem Pantalón on Glasgow's Numbers imprint and the late night groove of Space Jam on Smallville Records. On The Bells, Kovács pops open his trunk full of sounds nicked from the lost and found bins of nightclubs all over the world. From the distorted organ chords of BB to the stripped down trancehall beats of Josey’s Tune or Szív Utca and the title track's cinematic romanticism, it's all of the bells and all of the whistles - further positioning Kornél Kovács as one of the most characteristic producers of modern house music.

The record was completed in an intense two-week session with Kovács' great friend and great studio engineer Matt Karmil in the winter of 2016. Another close friend, artist Malin Gabriella Nordin, has created the album artwork together with her brother Jonas.

Prompted directly by Kovács to give his report on the record, Studio Barnhus label boss Axel Boman had the following to say:"Kornél's bells will echo far beyond the nervous and trend sensitive ”dance" genre that our label sometimes is associated with, and into pop history. It’s one of our best, most innovative and creative releases to date, and the fact that one of my best friends has managed to do this on the label we share together makes me so proud that I want to cry. The Bells is the reason I dreamed of starting a label in the first place."

Mule Musiq announces the new album from Eddie C, set for release on the Tokyo label's Endless Flight imprint on 26th August.

'On The Shore' follows the Canadian DJ & producer's two previous Endless Flight LPs, 'Parts Unknown' (2011) and 'Country City Country' (2013). The album formats will be CD, digital, 2xLP vinyl and a limited edition vinyl package with bonus two-track 7-inch. -----“hopefully they do not fit into too many sub-genre categories” says canadian producer and dj edward currelly aka eddie c about his twelve new tracks. they are the body of his new album “on the shore” - a compelling musical trip of drifting repetition in rhythm and melody. the album was recorded entirely in his studio in the wedding district of berlin, on the shore of the panke river, his new favourite part of a city.

eddie confesses: “berlin has been so crazy... i have mixed feelings sometimes. such extreme highs and lows! the emotions i've had here are like none i've ever had to deal with before. i don't know if the city is haunted or what...

"i've had many sleepless nights especially in the wintertime. i suppose the music is a mix of feelings and inspiration from life here.” it truly is, as the story arc of his sample-laden longplayer oscillates between sweet sadness and warming blissfulness. there are strings that can evoke tears. there are synth lines that may generate dreams. there are guitars that are able to introduce levitation. but not only berlin itself is part of this wonderfully sensitive round dance.

c’s life as a traveling dj must also have had a great effect on his art. ”i've always written music and always been deejaying. they both came around the same time when i was very young. but i've never quite connected the two. i've always thought that they were very different avenues of expression. all the travelling in the last while has been a beautiful experience and so very inspiring and exhausting. the strangest part has to be having friends all over the world that i am developing relationships with for a few days at a time, once or twice a year. very unnatural! or is it wonderful? likely both!

"one thing i really wish i had more of is routine. something that many people wish to escape. it's the unfortunate human condition eh?.. grass is always greener.” he reveals. regardless of what has more influence on his music – the travel or the city of berlin – for a listener it makes no difference where the emotional subtext is originated. also eddie did not dismiss what he has always enjoyed: arranging a mix of instruments, synths, samples and drum machines, that cuts deep into your soul. each track is an intimate meditation. sometimes it grooves in the downtempo fields, sometimes cosmic disco calls the tune and house is around too, but in quite an in-depth wrapping, all propelled by pulsing keys, pitch bends and crashing drum loops.

the routine eddie talks about must be somewhat a part of his life as his usage of samples, his rhythmical accuracy and his sense for small but extra touching melody particles are not just coming from one spontaneous surge of emotion. and he was not alone for the recording of every tune. he also enjoyed the company of his norwegian buddy rune lindbaek, known for fearless edits and tripping leftfield dance music. he is a guest on the handsomely wrong spelled track “auf der ufer” - a sublime synth-laden spacey tune in the heart of a playful album full of contrasting, deeply atmospheric stages in longing, that range from swinging and propulsive to blissed-out and bittersweet sensibilities.

“man is only fully human when he plays" the german poet, philosopher and playwright friedrich schiller once said. the music of eddie c proves this sageness. it is full of lust for life, party-hearty and at the same time about really strong feelings.

Tilliander - Nybliven Lots (Bright Sounds)

Following on from March's Shlømo remix package featuring Donato Dozzy, Bambounou and label boss Kennedy Smith, Bright Sound's second release of 2016 will new a brand new EP from Sweden's Andreas Tilliander.

With his releases on his own Repeatle imprint and his TM404 alias's hardware-driven techno featuring on Skudge White and Kontra-Musik, Tilliander is among Sweden's most versatile talents working right now. His arrival on Bright Sounds is of a piece with BSRX 004, last year's reissue of fellow Swede Henrik Johansson's 1997 EP as Smyglyssna. As with Johansson's record, Tilliander's Stettin Libau EP explores slower tempo techno, locating the moments of space and energy in between its rhythmic structures.

This search is most keenly observed in 'Knapp Ledsyn', with its ever-shifting sonic landscape melting away at various points to reveal its unusual, skeletal beats and hidden melodic details, while the EP title track and 'Nybliven Lots' apply that approach to what might at first be a traditional dub techno template, yet still offering further small moments of off-beat character. Completing the release is a 'Detox Operation' remix of 'Knapp Ledsyn' from Nonplace Records chief Burnt Friedman, in which the German veteran strips things down to a gentle patter of drums overlaid with suggestive flashes of the original's rich atmospheric elements.

Pampa Records boss & all-round beloved dance music maestro DJ Koze turns his golden touch to Låpsley's new single, 'Operator', from her album 'Long Way Home' out now on XL Recordings. Koze takes the spring-heeled 60s pop swing of the original and turns in an extended 12" Paradise Garage version that would make Tom Moulton proud.

Generation Next - Our Time In Different Lives (7 Days Ent.)

The younger member of Big Strick & 7 Days Ent's father-son team returns with three new works of soulful Detroit deepness.

Damon Bell - Ankh Boogie (Don't Be Afraid)

Format: EP / 12", digitalRelease date: July 01 2016Cat. #: DBA025

Tracklist:A1 Ankh BoogieB1 Aural AfrekB2 Time For Change

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Damon Bell arrives on DBA with a debut three-track EP that delves deep into the musical influences that shape his sound. Best known for his output on fellow Oaklander Aybee's Deepblak Recordings - where he holds the title "Chief Connoisseur"- Bell has won ardent admirers both with his string of EPs and with last year's debut LP 'Blues For The Libyan', in addition to releases on R&S sub-label Meda Fury.

The trio of tracks that make up the Ankh Boogie EP find Bell returning to the dynamic African rhythms of his most floor-friendly work, with live instrumentation layered over an electronic pulse. Having had his start as a teenager obsessing over Afro-Cuban jazz and jazz fusion, his long-standing devotion to learning and adapting the music's polyrhythmic sensibilities in his own music, coupled with the voyages of sound Deepblak is known for, result in a unique collage of sounds that at various moments can recall the likes of Joe Claussell, DJ Qu and Ron Trent. Where the title track plays with sun-kissed melodies and percussive elements, the B1, Aural Afrek, goes into darker techno territory, while B2 cut Time For Change is an organ-led house workout.

Ian Pooley’s beloved 1998 album Meridian receives its first digital release this summer with a special 2016 edition. The re-release will mark the first time classic Pooley tracks such as What’s Your Number, Followed, Cold Wait, Flatlet, Hit N’ Run and Long Johns will be available on digital formats. They will form part of an 19-track package that include brand new remixes from Bicep and Oskar offermann, as well as contemporary mixes from Kevin Saunderson, Jazzanova and Bob Sinclar previously unreleased outside of Japan.

Of the new mixes, Belfast house stars Bicep apply their remix magic to Cold Wait, streamlining the Pooley classic into a chunky UK house thumper which has already proven a winner in their sets, while WHITE label boss Oskar Offermann delivers a subtle, grooving UK Garage-inspired take on Hit N’ Run. What’s Your Number receives its own rework by Pooledmusic family member Mathias ’SHOW-B’ Schober, whose remix manifests itself as a starry-eyed version that elevates the original’s melancholic side.

The package is completed by a selection of remixes dated from 2000 and previously only available on bonus CD with the Japanese edition of Pooley’s subsequent LP, Since Then: a version of Cold Wait by Kevin Saunderson (under his E-Dancer guise) and three alternate takes on What’s Your Number by Germany’s soulful broken beat troupe Jazzanova, French house superstar Bob Sinclar and Chris Duckenfield &amp; Richard Brown’s Swag project.

FXHE/Echocord's Luke Hess and Black Crow bosses Deep'a & Biri rework a pair of lush ambient techno productions by Italy's 2030--------------The sixth release on Deep'a & Biri's Black Crow label welcomes another new name into the fold: Nico Campanella has been quietly building a stellar reputations for himself over the past few years, working under a variety of aliases to explore a sound that much like Deep'a & Biri draws deeply from techno's Detroit heritage as well as the propulsive dub techno of Basic Channel. With releases for several high quality under-the-radar European techno labels, including Construct Re-form, CLFT, Monnom Black and his own label Subosc, Campanelli's Kaelan and 2030 projects in particular have won him some ardent admirers & plenty of tips as a talent to keep an eye on.

It's as 2030 that he joins Black Crow, for the Timeworm EP, which is completed by remixes from FXHE's Luke Hess and the label's Tel Aviv-based founders. The EP's original track are a pair of lushly-produced classic Detroit-influenced excursions, redolent of the cascading ambient textures and string melodies found within the work of the city's first wave pioneers. A1 cut 'In aeternum' could easily be mistaken for a lost early 90s classic in the best possible sense, while the title track also draws on a similarly timeless quality.

With the original track ensuring the EP package will win other home listeners, it's the remixers who shape them for the dancefloor. Luke Hess's 'In aeturnum' remix is powerful dancefloor workout that retains a softer edge, recalling the producer's recent collaboration with OB Ignitt. On the B side, Deep'a & Biri offer two of their own interpretations of the title track, pulling the track across the dub techno galaxy with their trademark dexterity. Completing a truly exceptional package is beautiful hand drawn artwork by Israeli artist Avraham Guy Barchil.

The next release on Subject Detroit is the result of two Techno Titans joining forces. Label head DJ Bone presents a Subject Detroit first, a split-release with none other than the mighty Deetron. The two have been fans of each other's work for many years so this seemed like a most logical idea.

Side D (D for Deetron) sees Deetron in impeccable form with 3 uniquely different versions of his masterpiece “The Core”. The Core takes you on a deliberate journey from Deetron's Swiss roots straight to Detroit, one foot in the House realm, the other firmly planted in the funky domain of Techno. Strong, driving rhythms escort you through the vibe to an amazing crescendo and back. There are three versions to choose from, each creating a different energy for the floor.

Side B (B for Bone) houses DJ Bone's “Black Patterns”. Black Patterns is a true advancement and update to the Detroit Techno model. The main mix starts off in true DJ Bone fashion, hitting you right in the face, with a succession of beautiful piano stabs. A voice chanting "Black Patterns" echoes in announcing what is about to unfold. Uptempo, rhythmic, untamed drums arrive to complete this immense vibe. All three versions tell their stories and indicate that DJ Bone's upcoming album is going to be one hell of a release. If Techno, House and Jazz had a baby...his name would be Black Patterns.

This is the first in a series of releases by the duo. And to further enhance their endeavor Deetron and DJ Bone will begin touring together in 2016. They will be playing solo as well as back-to-back and will debut several unreleased tracks during their sets.

Marcel Fengler - Kyu (IMF)

Marcel Fengler returns to his own IMF imprint with three new tracks charting the diverse musical moods defined by his 2013 debut album Fokus. Originally slated for an Ostgut Ton release, the tracks now find a new home on his own label to mark the beginning of the post-Ostgut chapter in his career.

With “Kyu” laid out on the A-side, this new 12" starts off with a delicate yet muscular floor-pleaser – its subtle 4/4 rhythm is counteracted by lush claps on 2/4, but the true finesse comes in form of its varying rhythmic details, crisp hi-hats and underlying, subtle melodies, most notably the twirling organ trills, sustained synth pads and alienated shout outs.

“Shitau” on B1 picks up on these introverted and adoring musical moods with more organic bell percussion and swelling synth layers adding a more cinematic touch to the complex rhythm patterns—then pausing for a short dreamy break, gaining speed again before culminating in a grand finale. “Zen” follows up with intimate string arrangements until Fengler varies the tone and tempo with tribalist percussion and a lush kick drum.

"Both tracks were made and released in 1997 on limited run vinyl, now somewhat hard to find. They straddle many lines between dance music and experimental, between techno and minimal and even manage to bridge two sides of Deupree’s career as a musician. Moving from his work with the seminal Prototype 909 and closer towards the elegant and ultra-minimal compositions for his 12k imprint, these tracks represent a beginning of this transition.

Rather than just reiterate the originals, this edition carries remixes by two of the most capable producers currently riding the edges of graceful minimalism and muscular techno. ROD turns the A1 “Untitled” into a heady tool with a pounding kick and mechanized samples of the original, while Marco Shuttle’s mix of the track takes flight with the track's musical tone and brings it to a transcendent elegy, leaning as much on Philip Glass and Steve Reich as it does on dancefloor paradigms.

Taken collectively the tracks and remixes show a nuanced look at a pivotal moment in techno, balanced with contemporary voices, as well as the blurred lines between electronic minimalism and dancefloor epiphanies." - Kevin McHugh, Valence

Fred Peterkin is back on Mule Musiq with another record that demonstrates the many cosmic qualities of his deeper shade of soul. '6' marks the second part of a trilogy featuring his detailed sonic landscapes, full of mystery and power. While his last FP-Oner album '5' leaned more to the jazzier, relaxed side of his artistically deep house expressions, the follow-up delves even deeper into his spiritual and meditative worlds. The LP's eleven tracks are not made "for club use only" - all its compositions work sublimely without big speakers. Once again the NYC native, deep into an incredibly prolific career spanning almost 20 years, has produced a journey inwards that is compelling, mesmerising and enchanting.

You will find cosmic dust as well as dark entropies; percussive power, sweet seducing melodies and rolling bass power that shakes your inner and outer profoundly. Track names like “Awakening Co-creator”, “Alternate Reality” or “Adjusted Perception” and the album title '6' all intend for a deeper meaning that Peterkin describes thus: “6 represents the number of man and his or her limitations, weakness and imperfections. This body of work examines and looks towards one awakening; adapting to a new way of being, creating an alternative and reaping a higher state of mind and being, enhanced by love and serenity, satisfaction and joy.”

The productions were produced around the world: Fred P carries his studio with him when on tour, enabling him to get up in the middle of the night, or the morning after a sweaty party, to transfer his emotions directly into sound. The result is powerful music with slow, intimate passages for sweet melodies, stirring synth-lines and propulsive rhythms., designed to grow in power with each listen: "My music is designed to enhance deep meditative, or altered states, to allow the listener to personally connect to the creator of all that exists in the universe: to first create a foundation using cyclic, polyrhythmic music, then build several layers of improvised leads and rhythms that allows you to transcend time and space… We have memories of past lives that reverberate in our hearts like echoes from ancient caves”.

Fred P's younger years found him on the dancefloors of legendary New York clubs Red Zone, Sound Factory or Tunnel, absorbing the sets of larger-than-life selectors such as David Morales, Frankie Knuckles or Danny Tenaglia. During those nights he learned that sometimes less is more, and to listen to his heart and soul, then move accoridng to the vagaries of the fickle music market. To that end most of the EPs and albums that he produced under his various monikers, including his best known Fred P or Black Jazz Consortium aliases, have been released via his very own label Soul People Music, now ten years in operation. In addition, he also dropped 12inches on Jus-Ed’s Underground Quality imprint and on Toshiya Kawasaki’s Mule Musiq label. It is for the latter that he now is releasing this second part of an album trilogy under the FP-Oner alias, with the third to be revealed in the near future.

John Osborn & Tallmen785 - The Curfew (TANSTAAFL Planets)

Format: EP / 12", digitalRelease date: May 27 2016Cat. #: TANSPLAN010

Tracklist:A1 CurfewB1 Mono CoreB2 Growl

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It was September 2013 when John Osborn & October released the first TANSTAAFL PLANETS record, KEL by Elias from Skudge. Now in May 2016, and following contributions from artists including Joey Anderson, John Daly and Lando & Xavier, the tenth and last TANSTAAFL PLANETS will see the light of day: A collaboration between John Osborn & long time TANSTAAFL family member Tallmen785.

TANSTAAFL PLANETS was original created as a sub-label but it eventually became clear that PLANETS was just a series, finishing on the tenth release. The end of this PLANETS series will give birth to a new series, with a new look & ethos. The next series of ten records curated by John Osborn & October will be known as the TANSTAAFL DRED collection: another series of ten records, pressed on 10" green wax & limited to 300 copies. Each release will feature two tracks of mutant dub house techno & disco. Starting with DRED01 by Sven von Thülen in late November, the series will also feature contributions from Tom Diccico, HBNG & Henning Baer.

John Osborn & Tallmen785 have worked together in Berlin for some time and the last release by the duo was seen in 2015 on Tom Diccico’s Run Out Run imprint. The pair have since this release developed an artistic relationship, which has giving birth to a unique sound that is an amalgamation of both producers musical vision; Tallmen785 coming from a more thumping techno background and John from his well established deep dubby house & techno excursions.

Now they bring you a driving three tracker; The Curfew EP. The three tracks are compiled and crafted with trippy pulsating bass lines, alien synth leads, whipping jungle snares, and skipping high hats that sound as though they have all been produced by an alien lizard race from the constellation Draco. If you don’t believe us, ask David Icke (artwork) or just give it a listen yourself - but careful these frequencies may cause abduction by a reptilian race. Which is also pretty trippy.

Kevin McHugh will release his first artist album as LA-4A in May 2016. ‘Phonautograph’ will arrive on McHugh’s own Delft imprint, the label that in his own words is dedicated to “roots techno” - acid & electro-indebted machine-based house & techno.

The genesis of Phonautograph begins with teenage McHugh in Washington DC, seeing Fugazi for the first time. As an induction into the DC punk scene, it introduced him to a way of thinking about music that has resonated with him until this day, manifesting itself in the raw immediacy in his work as LA-4A. The alias was donned for the first time when McHugh launched Delft in 2013 with the underground hit ‘Invader’, a track that, alongside the rest of the label’s output, continues to be a secret weapon for DJs including Mike Servito, Gerd Janson, Erol Alkan and Bicep. Since its inception, Delft has been home to all LA-4A original tracks to date, in addition to releases from Matrixxman, Vernon Felicity, Alden Tyrell, Vin Sol and JPLS. LA-4A has also contributed remixes to New York's Throne of Blood and Voodoo Down labels, and will issue a first original EP outside of Delft for DJ Haus' Unknown To The Unknown imprint later in 2016.

The two decades since that Fugazi show have taken McHugh from hearing a friend DJ the industrial/EBM room of DC’s Tracks club, to playing his own all-time favourite records at Berghain as LA-4A. Stops in between in Baltimore (where he attended the same school as future Delft artist Alden Tyrell, there on a study abroad program), London (where he made his first steps into DJing at his student union bar in 1995), NYC (where he began a career in art, working at the Andrea Rosen Gallery, while also running his own parties and booking the likes of Sonic Youth, Zip, Mogwai, Porter Ricks, Mos Def & DJ Spooky for Creative Time’s Music in The Anchorage series underneath the Brooklyn Bridge) and Berlin (where he moved in 2004 to help Richie Hawtin build the first Plastikman live show, using his knowledge of technology and audio-visual installations, before beginning his own music production career).

Over twenty years of the collected interest and expertise in music, art and technology have coalesced into the resulting LA-4A album, with its titles (and artist name itself) named for analogue communication technologies that at one point heralded a new future before receding into obsolescence. The artwork is also drawn from McHugh’s time in the art world, with DL Alvarez contributing a hand-drawn reproduction of a still image from Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey: as with all LA-4A productions, the artwork is a result of analogue source material which is then digitally manipulated.

Phonautograph represents an artist album in its purest sense: a deeply personal work that feels like the culmination of a lifetime of passion and experience - one that ebbs and flows across a variety of styles and tempos, from the electrifying acid house and electro of ‘Resistor’, 'Capacitance' and ‘Dialup’ to slower tempo ambient and experimental excursions such as ‘Frequenzvariabler’, ‘Blitzlicht’ and ‘Semantron’.

“The core of techno music is anchored around a vision of the future that was formed 20-30 years ago. The hardware and approaches are less about continually redefining this futurism, than about enjoying the beauty of a fantasy that is somewhat obsolete now. Now that the devices in our pocket have more technology than entire studios once had, and our present day abilities are beyond the imaginations of that era, I feel the need to embrace the simultaneous obsolescence and relevance of these tools. The tracks on the album are all inspired by technologies that helped create a ‘tomorrow’, but were quickly obsolete by the time that tomorrow arrived. The title comes from the very first ever created audio recording technology, which predated Edison’s phonograph, and has lingered in obscurity since. It’s fitting to use 2001 as the springboard for the album artwork: a vision of the future we’ve already surpassed, and made with completely analog tools.” - Kevin McHugh aka LA-4A

Shit Robot - What Follows (DFA)

Tracklist:1 In Love (w/ Alexis Taylor)2 What Follows (w/ Museum Of Love)3 Ten Miles High4 Lose Control (w/ Nancy Whang)5 End Of The Trail (w/ Alexis Taylor)6 Phase Out (w/ New Jackson)7 Wir Warten8 Is There No End (w/ Jay Green)9 OB-8 (Winter Mix)

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Marcus Lambkin aka Shit Robot returns with his third full length album for DFA Records, entitled What Follows. The 11-track album was conceived and recorded at Marcus’ home studio in a small town outside Stuttgart; worked on in various New York studios and then mixed over the course of 11 intense & coffee-fuelled days in DFA label mate Juan Maclean’s New Hampshire studio.

The album follows Lambkin’s previous long-players, From The Cradle To The Rave (2010) and We Got A Love (2014), which drew plaudits from the likes of The Guardian and Pitchfork, and featured Reggie Watts and James Murphy among the array of contributors.

The Dublin-born producer has enlisted the help of a stellar cast of guests for What Follows, with previous collaborators Alexis Taylor (Hot Chip) and DFA stablemates Museum of Love and Nancy Whang returning, alongside new faces Jay Green and leftfield fellow Dubliner New Jackson.

What Follows marks a departure in Lambkin’s process - a simple, but fundamental one: getting away from the computer. He said: “This record is a lot more analog than 'We Got A Love', almost all of it comes from connecting machines together and playing around.” What was your biggest influence? “Drum machines.” What began in Stuttgart was followed up on in New York, before being finished in an 11-day blitz in New Hampshire with Juan Maclean.

Lambkin: “This is the first time that I actually sat down and said, ‘I'm going to make an album now and I'm going to finish it by a specific date and time.’ I wanted to make a record that was more cohesive, that sounded like it all came from the one session. I wanted it to reflect my DJing style a bit more, less pop, less disco, more machines. There's no live bass and barring a few hi-hats, there's no live drums.

“I began in Stuttgart - simply by creating about 12 drum loops. I then synched these up to some gear and created some bass lines so I had some solid grooves to start with. Then I went to NY and spent a couple of days at Holy Ghost's studio playing around with Nick and his modular synth coming up with different sequences and sounds. I then took all this over to Transmitter Park Studios in Greenpoint and spent a few days with the wizard that is Morgan Wiley of Midnight Magic and Tippy Toes. He's one of my favourite keyboard players on the planet. Sometimes I had a specific thing I wanted him to do, but mostly I just played him some things I like and got him to jam out on what I had come up with or play some nice chords or chord progressions.

“I took all this back home and started to fool around with it and knock it into shape before sending it out for vocals. With the song I did with Museum Of Love, 'What Follows', Dennis and Pat were actually in Europe and they came by and stayed with me for a few days, so we made that one in Stuttgart over a few nights once I got the kids to bed. It was particularly fun and easy. I think the wine helped.

“Then I brought it all to Juan's World in New Hampshire where we drank a LOT of coffee and did some additional production and mixed everything. Finishing the record with Juan was a game changer for me. We worked so hard. We finished eleven songs in eleven days, no joke.”

The results are convincing - What Follows is definitely an album dedicated to dance music, but one that retains hallmarks of his previous LPs: good songs. Alexis Taylor turns in two memorable performances on lead single ‘End Of The Trail’ and album opener ‘In Love’; Museum of Love - Pat Mahoney and Dennis McNany - lend the album title track an air of something mined from the two months in between the death of Joy Division and the birth of New Order; and Nancy Whang gave such a strong vocal for ‘Lose Control’ that Lambkin and Maclean threw out the existing track and recorded the backing along with the vocal in one take, which the two producers working the machines live. Lambkin: “I had so much fun with Lose Control - and it inspired me to make so much more music. I've written 12 new tracks since finishing the record.”

Newbies Jay Green and New Jackson hit their marks too - Green - best known for fronting American punk bands Orchid and Panthers - narrates Is There No End as though it were sibling to From The Cradle To The Rave’s single Simple Things. New Jackson makes two appearances, on both Phase Out and OB-8 (Winter Version), adding oddball vocals and spaced-out Krautrock guitar arrangements.

How did the guests come about? Lambkin: “I didn't have a big plan, I just knew that I wanted to work with friends. I knew I wanted to do something with Museum Of Love again. I also knew I would do something with Nancy, I couldn't make a Shit Robot record without Nancy. Then while I was working on End Of The Trail, I could hear Alexis's voice in my head, it just seemed a perfect fit. New Jackson is my younger brother’s old room mate and I've wanted to do something with Jay ever since I made the Green Machine 12”s a few years back.”

What Follows was preceded by two 12” singles - Where Its At (Feat. Reggie Watts), backed with a killer remix from Johnny Aux - and original version of album closer OB-8.

March 04 sees the release of lead single End Of The Trail (featuring Alexis Taylor), which will receive its world premiere on Zane Lowe's Beats 1 radio show on Wednesday 02 March. It will be followed by a remix from Dial's Roman Fluegel on March 10, available on limited white 12” and digital.

The next single, Lose Control (featuring Nancy Whang), drops one week before the full album, with Spencer Parker on remix duties.

Midland - Blush (Graded)

Format: EP / 12", digitalRelease date: April 29 2016Cat. #: GRD003

Tracklist:A. BlushB1. OutpostB2. Holdup

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Midland returns with his third release for his own Graded outlet, with the first new material on the label since 2013's Drumtrak. In the intervening period Harry Agius has launched Graded's sample-based house & disco sub-label ReGraded; released a solo EPs for Will Saul's Aus Music; collaborated with Bicep; remixed Darkstar for Warp; and released the debut album of his AKASE project with vocalist Robert Redway on !K7 Records.

Finally getting a release after months in high demand since Agius's Boiler Room set alongside DJ Harvey last summer, 'Blush' highlights Midland's innate ability to create instantly recognisable hooks married to dynamic rhythms and sound design. It's backed with two more cuts debuted in Midland's recent Essential Mix that carry his signature blend of US & UK electronic music influences, creating another indelible package from the multi-faceted producer & DJ.

Magical, mystical and straight from the heart: After "Until Then, Goodbye" (2009) and "A Day In The Life" (2014), the Hamburg-based art curator, DJ and producer Lawrence releases “Yoyogi Park” - the third part of an album trilogy for Mule Musiq in collaboration with artist Stefan Marx

The album explores unknowingly relations between his very own ambient productions, acoustic sound experiments and the driving force of the dancefloor. The artwork depocts a 360° degree view of Yoyogi Park in the heart of Tokyo, created by Stefan Marx for the 2015 NYC's book fair's fanzine.

Known to all people in Tokyo and worldwide, Yoyogi Park seems to be just another gorgeous everyday green life spot. But behind its beauty and anonymity you can find much craziness and mystery, like the latest ten tracks by Lawrence: behind his abstract beats and compelling functionality you will discover areas of magic with a full-colour palette of mind-expanding sounds.

Some of his album tracks contain live samples recorded in hometown Hamburg with his band Sky Walking, consisting of Christian Naujoks, RVDS and himself. Others are new versions of previously-released, dreamily sublime ambient tracks. A one-of-a-kind blend of varied, deep, widescreen and star-crossed electronica that's both romantic and enchanting.

His excellent new recordings seduce with in-depth house rhythm sensibilities, while spreading otherworldly melodies that are almost physical. Some started in his cosy backyard studio in Hamburg. Others have been crafted and tested out on the road between cities like Berlin, Buenos aires, New York City and Tokyo. They are all highly entertaining, with some analogue warmth in the bloodline that spreads mystery and allure.

Lawrence also used field recordings recorded while in the streets, parks and nature. Little particles of a compelling bigger musical picture that carries us from joy to melancholy. And though the album is made for the dancefloor, its shimmering brilliance goes far beyond usual club music euphoria.

Wonderful compelling stuff that could be the perfect starting point for anyone interested in delving into Lawrence's exclusive world of intimacy and subtly shifting grooves and tones. It is an enchanting one, where feelings unfold in rhythms and melodies without losing their intenseness during their transfer.

Jamie Krasner aka James K will launch her She Rocks label on April 15 2016 with the release of her debut album, PET. The album will be released on vinyl and digital formats in collaboration with Dial Records, with Vancouver's 1080p issuing a cassette edition. ------- James K is a stranger to obviousness. Over the past few years the New York native has quietly honed her sound and peculiar aesthetic. Equally organic and electronic, her sound is a combination of odd dreams, industrial beats and vocals, both incomprehensible and appealing, with a thick layer of glitter on top of it. James K is a concentrated dose of emotion mixed with sorrowful iciness, which in turn ties together ripped, broken, morphed and enchanted samples. James K stands for a fusion of visual and sonic elements, deeply rooted in conscious art practice and downright freak-out. James K creates a mythology of her own. ‘PET,’ her first LP due out in early 2016, will be a co-release with Dial and her own label, She Rocks! A special edition of the album with added bonus tracks and interludes with be released on cassette through Canadian label 1080p.

In James K’s words: ‘The underlying desire of “PET” divides into two parts: an escape into ethereality and a mischievous denial of my own experience. It narrates my search for honest expression by means of the premature denial- a childish excursion into a world of monstrosity and innocence.

PET reflects my mental state during its production - as a person, I was owned, objectified and hurt by other, and that wound I then unwillingly internalized. I turned to my music as a way to dissect these thoughts. The product became my possession, or “pet.” In retrospective, this process gives me strength over myself; love— knowledge and wisdom enacted. The arrangement of the music and the PET itself relates to my endless struggle, namely, my attempts to reclaim myself.’

Her ‘Sokit’ 7” is a double track single for her album, which she released last Spring. James K is featured on the recent compilation released by Dial Records for their 15-year anniversary, and a mini LP of her noise pop project SETH (along with producer Gobby), was also recently released by label 1080p in June, in cassette and digital form. She rocks.

Detroit native MGUN aka Manuel Gonzales returns from a two year break from releasing to unveil his debut LP for Don’t Be Afraid. Marking the UK-based label’s first artist album (DBALP001), ‘Gentium’ follows a string of highly acclaimed releases on labels also including The Trilogy Tapes, Wild Oats, Third Ear, BAKK, Berceuse Heroique and FIT.

“About half of these tracks were made in my childhood home between 2007 and 2010. Most were recorded on cassette then digitized on a Windows millennium edition PC. I would record these to the standard WAV recorder you can find in the sound preferences, which from there it was possible to use primitive effects to manipulate the audio file."

“The other half were produced in my current home studio, using somewhat of the same system I used back then, one take for the most part. There is hardly any multi-tracking involved with any of my productions. I use a basic WAV editor to manipulate recordings as well as various analog recording mediums beforehand.”

In drawing from these recordings and methods developed over such a long period of time, Gentium captures the growth of a modern electronic artist in a way few albums do, charting the evolution from an unknown quantity in the birthplace of techno to the DJ & producer widely admired today for the fresh immediacy of his approach.

Digger supreme, Major Problem label affiliate and Dublin local hero Compassion Crew opens his vaults for ‘Compassion Cuts, Tapes & Acetates’. This curious 11-tracker is the culmination of years of patient and persistent collecting, chasing, calling, faxing, internet mailing, wining, dining and those all-too-rare deserts: lucky breaks. The search took him from an attic in America’s mid-west, to chasing holy-grail master tapes in Rome, BBQ’ing with Ethiopian synth royalty in Dublin and then further: to Sweden, the UK, Germany and Switzerland.

‘Compassion Cuts, Tapes & Acetates’ - the first LP on Major Problems - runs through a rarified selection of raw analogue house and most-wanted italo; 808 and vocoder jams, proto-house; dope synth workouts; private press gospel and some experimental tracks that just won’t be defined. Dig in.

The vinyl is available in a double-gatefold with full-colour artwork. A special edition includes the compilation, a sealed copy of Defuser’s private press LP, ’Music For A Comic Book Video’, from 1985, and a screen-print of Simon Landrein’s cover art.

About Compassion Crew: CC is a producer based in Dublin, Ireland. He has released music on Rush Hour, Dolly, Horn Wax and Major Problems. He is also known as B.D.I.. He is an avid collector of interesting music.

Red Rack'Em - Wonky Bassline Disco Banger (Bergerac)

It’s been a busy 3 years since Danny Berman aka Red Rack’em released on his own Bergerac imprint. Since then he’s toured relentlessly, released a whole album of live music based disco/punk funk for Sonar Kollektiv as Hot Coins, managed to completely update his biggest track ‘In Love Again’ to make it a hit the second time around plus released spaced out, wonky party smashers on Wolf Music, Phonica, City Fly and Telefonplan.

While all this was going on Bergerac was largely on ice but now Berman is turning his energy back to the label with a vengeance with a hot EP which is already picking up plays from Dixon, Ame, Hunee, Midland, Axel Boman and Inkswel.

A - Wonky Bassline Disco Banger is accurately titled. An uplifting piano intro breaks down into a slamming disco house number and just when you think you know what’s going on…then the trademark Red Rack’em wonky bass drops in. 150% Guaranteed party smasher…

B1- Jazzy House Extension is super vintage Red Rack’em from around 2004 – something for the jazz heads out there – cracked out piano and far too loud double bass come together to birth a euphoric yet banging snapshot of a producer learning his chops.

B2 – Destined is a slightly demented leftfield house number featuring mangled, pitch shifting fretless bass and vocals samples discussing someones destiny. A woozy end to the EP.

As ever the label artwork features bespoke illustrations from German artist Silke Eiselt of significant buildings in Dannys life in chronological order. This time it’s the den of iniquity he shared on Ralph Road in Bristol in 1997 during his junglist years and the Brampton Drive house in Liverpool during the television editor days of 1998.

Peggy Gou - The Art of War Pt1 (Rekids)

Rekids begins 2016 with the launch of an exciting new talent. South Korea-born DJ and producer Peggy Gou has been honing her production skills since her days in London. Having moved to the UK capital at age 14, she began producing tracks at a prodigious rate while studying university, honing her sound and refining her skills with advice from some of the city’s most renowned DJs and producers until she had crafted an initial selection that will form her debut EP, set for release Rekids in January 2016.

Now based in Berlin, Gou has drawn on her years of DJing to help shape a sound that draws on Detroit & NYC house, as well as the African rhythmic sensibility and boogie funk influences she shares with Early Sounds duo Nu Guinea, with whom she had piano lessons and sought production advice from as her music took shape. In addition to her work as a stylist and fashion producer, Gou has also drawn on her art & design abilities to create the EP artwork.

The Art of War 12" includes two original productions plus a remix from White Material's Galcher Lustwerk. The original mix of Troop centres on a funk bassline which propels its dream-like tropical groove, while Lustwerk's remix re-purposes the track as a Fred P-esque jazz-infused star-gazer. The EP's other original production, In Sum, again asserts Gou's talent for raw, propulsive rhythms and subtle melodies.

трип (Trip) will close out 2015 with the release of two more eight-track double-vinyl albums, curated by label owner Nina Kraviz and featuring gatefold hand drawn artwork by in-house artist Tombo. The releases draw on productions from established Trip members Kraviz, Bjarki, Terrence Dixon, Barcode Population and Nikita Zabelin, in addition to new artists added to its expanding catalogue including K-Hand, Fred P, DJ Sodeyama, Vladimir Dubyshkin, Roma Zuckerman and Philipp Gorbachev.

As established with the label’s first three releases, both collections will function as a soundtrack to scenarios and the accompanying artwork from Tombo. TRP004’s title ‘Ivan, Come On! Unlock The Box!’ (Иван, давай! Открой коробку!) is inspired by the track contributed by Philipp Gorbachev (Comeme/PG Tunes), from which Kraviz has extrapolated a story of a rule-defying maverick Ivan who is “searching for the key to the future”, while TRP005’s title ‘I Have A Question’ is drawn from a track by the mysterious, hitherto-unreleased Krasnoyarsk-born Siberian producer Roma Zuckerman.

TRP005, due in early December, meanwhile explores subtler and slower tempo variants on Trip’s sonic signature than the tougher-sounding 004. In addition to another modular cut from Kraviz, ‘Let’s Do It’, and tracks by Bjarki and Population One, 004’s K-HAND, Roma Zuckerman and Vladimir Dubyshkin all return, while Fred P and Dommune's DJ Sodeyama both make their label debuts. Kraviz’s edit of Fred P’s Higher Mentalism gets its official release following its appearance on her DJ-Kicks mix in early 2015.

Petre Inspirescu - Vin Ploile (Mule Musiq)

Having previously released two studio albums on the [a:rpia:r] label he co-runs with fellow Romanians Rhadoo and Raresh (in addition to a 2013 Fabric mix comprised solely of his own productions), Petre Inspirescu returns to Tokyo's Mule Musiq following a label debut in 2014 with the Talking Waters 12". His latest long-player sees the Bucharest producer stepping away from the classical-influenced rolling house sounds of his best known records for an album comprised almost entirely of live instrumentation.

Although falling under the umbrella of 'ambient', a genre Mule Musiq has explored to great effect in the past twelve months via albums from Lawrence and Sebastian Mullaert & Eitan Reiter, Inspirescu's new project explores a wider soundscape of dub, latin and experimental electronic music, using only piano, string & wind instrument elements and analogue electronics to craft a deep and hypnotic arrangement of tones and rhythms. Vin Ploile will be released on Mule Musiq on November 4th 2015.

Oskar Offermann will release his new album 'Le Grand To Do' on Toshiya Kawasaki's Mule Musiq label in November. The new LP from the Frankfurt-born, Berlin-based DJ and producer's follows his 2012 debut 'Do Pilots Still Dream Of Flying?', released on the WHITE label he co-founded in 2007. The forthcoming release on Mule Musiq follows a previous appearance on the Tokyo label with the 'U Can You To Me Say' EP in 2012.

Since emerging with WHITE in the latter part of the last decade, Offermann has won fans with his frequent collaborations and back-tp-back DJ sets with Giegling regular Edward, in addition to further releases on other labels such as Aim, Thema and his edits-focused imprint, Rimini. In addition to a busy 2015 DJ schedule that has taken him across Europe, North America and Japan, he has also become a regular guest at Berghain's Panorama Bar, with five appearances so far this year. The new album is primarily composed of productions made in 2014, primarily based around the use of cheap drum machines such as the Alesis HR-16, Boss DR660, Yamaha RX 70 and other synths, while drawing influence from the hip hop of his Frankfurt youth and his passion for meditation.

Two years after his debut LP 'Love Based Music', Damiano von Erckert presents the follow up 'Also Known As Good', again combining a versatile spectrum of genre influences and collaborations with other a variety of artists coming from house, disco, jazz, techno, hip hop, soul and experimental.

'Also Known As Good‘ tells a story about club culture and the last 40 years of music, its genres and background. Through both solo productions and regular collaborations with Tito Wun, Hodini, May, Retrogott, Am Kinem transmitting the vibe of Cologne, AVA. and Damiano's perception of music has become known for traversing a myriad of styles via both sampling and live instrumentation.

To this end, Von Erckert adds to his cast of regular collaborators Tyler Pope, the former member of Warp Records' !!! who lends a Krautrock edge to the track 'Marcos, Jean, Ralf'; Chicago singer Amalia and New Jersey hip hop producer Miles Bonny. Together the combination feeds beautifully into the album's unifying concept as a love letter to the music that continues to inspire Damiano von Erckert.

Dial is proud to announce Grind, DJ Richard’s full-length debut on the label. The White Material Records co-founder is the newest addition to Dial Records’ artist roster. Grind compiles 9 tracks: 8 of them produced last winter in Berlin, while a version of “Screes of Grey Craig”, the track at the record’s center, was produced in 2013 and appeared as the soundtrack to New York fashion label Eckhaus Latta’s S/S 2014 collection.

The record is strongly influenced by the idea of the ocean: its salt, isolation, and the specific natural phenomena surrounding it. After living in Berlin for two years and feeling vaguely lost in the continent of Europe, DJ Richard found himself drawn to the coastline of his home state Rhode Island. There, from a suspension bridge that crosses the bay, one looks down on Rose Island on one side of said bridge and Gould Island on the other. These two geographical marks of RI, US Navy bunkers and Torpedo loading facilities for submarines during World War 2, both transformed into bird sanctuaries now, lay in total disrepair: inaccessible, but central to the entire area.

On the cover of the record, their photograph represents DJ Richard’s interest in those instances where the border between civilization and the ocean becomes something more ambiguous than just a coastline.

More specifically, the seclusion and mystery the ocean carries within it is a central theme of the record. Ranging from Drone to Techno, and often settling somewhere in between, the gloomy, loopy tracks embody this idea as well as their titles reference it: the natural phenomenon of the Green Flash referenced on the record’s A3, as well as on “I-Mir” (which is a certain type of Green Flash) is an actual green flash that is visible very rarely, at an unobstructed horizon, right after sunset, for about a second. The rareness of this phenomenon, which has hardly been documented in all its different forms, sets a contrast to the repetitiveness of the sunset that prefaces it.

This daily event lends Grind its title: the sun being ground into oblivion by the millstone that is the ocean, with a repetitiveness that is also central to most electronic music. This violent perception of something traditionally considered rather romantic says as much about these most melodic, cinematic tracks by DJ Richard released to date as they do about the comfort that can be found in isolation and ambiguity, in romanticizing hopelessness. In its sensitivity and rigor, Grind is made to be listened to all the way through, but split into its separate parts makes for excellent dancefloor material, too.

“When I started DJing I thought I had to make dancefloor-friendly music. But if you make music naturally for a long time you don’t feel comfortable with doing only dance music. I wanted to express my experiences from the past ten years, including the non-musical ones. That2019s why my new album is like a journal of my life - I added an open-minded diversity to it that shows my musical growth.”

For more than a decade producer and DJ Sunao Gonno has been an integral part of the house and techno scene in his home country Japan. His musical productions have not only appeared on esteemed local labels like W.C. Recordings or Nitelist Music - they have also been released on international imprints such as Re-Active or Perc Trax from London; Beyond Recordings from Detroit; International Feel Recordings from Uruguay/Ibiza; Merkur Schallplatten from Berlin; and Tim Sweeney’s NYC-based Beats In Space.

Furthermore, his special twisted house and techno arrangements have been frequently played by DJs including Laurent Garnier, James Holden, Francois Kevorkian and Todd Terje, while Gonno has also made a splash with remixes for legends like Jeff Mills.

As a DJ, the man from Tokyo2019s suburbs can look back on a long-lasting career: “My first time as a DJ was almost 20 years ago, at a club named Firecracker in the Ebisu district of Tokyo. At that time I played mainly New York-style house, and some techno like old Mike Ink and Josh Wink stuff. Today I like to play a hybrid style when I DJ”. Behind the decks or as a live performer, he has travelled the globe to wow audiences with his records, machines and the lost art of storytelling.

For new album Remember The Life Is Beautiful, Gonno has reclaimed the almost forgotten poetic art of a ‘musical journey’ and produced ten tracks that unite ambient, techno, house and other musical styles into a mesmerising sonic trip. Even while his second LP ventures on a multi-coloured musical trip that sometimes lifts you up while guiding you into an ambient galaxy just a minute later, Gonno has managed to inject a story arc that reflects all kinds of life circumstances he gone through in the past decade.

In opposite to many of his colleagues, he steers clear of sampling, instead making all new tracks by himself with the help of machines like his first synth, the Korg Triton; the Moog Little Phatty; Korg Volca Keys; a Roland TR-8; an MC-202; Acidlab Bassline; some cheap casio keyboards and other borrowed equipment like a Fender Stratocaster and an acoustic guitar.

In addition, his tracks been layered with recordings of his voice and handclaps, soft treated shakers and other unusual sound recordings. What unites the tracks unite is an expansive space and a signature of warm, natural atmosphere in which gentle arpeggios, charming chords and sweetly-indicated melodies float freely.

“I think people can call my music whatever they want. I hate to assign it to a specific genre. I have many musical idols and they all told me ‘kill your idols’. That’s why I don’t have a sense in belonging to something specific. It would mean less freedom, and my music should be always as free as possible” he declares.

It is a claim that all tracks on Remember The Life Is Beautiful honour with unconventional inventiveness. In sequence they sound like an endless flight through techno, house, new age, ambient and beyond, to which listeners should surrender in order to feel each emotional dimension Gonno’s music offers.

Deepblak Chief Connoisseur mon Bel, after years of several outstanding EPs, offers up his debut album 'ues For The Libyan"'. Staying true to his penchant for mixing African rhythms with dance floor aesthetics, the Oakland based producer weaves together a tightly-knit escapade thru his world.

Much like his long-standing DJ residencies at S.F.'s Make Out Room and Oakland's 389, Damon has built a solid reputation for his ability to traverse many sounds and genres in one coherent groove. 'Blues For The Libyan' follows suit as Damon melds experimentation and tradition into a palatable experience for the listener. Tapping into the talents of labelmate Afrikan Sciences for 'Rhythm Meat' and vocalist Khalil Anthony ('Chromosome Replacement'), the collaborations do well to further Damon's vision. having studied percussion in his youth, you can feel it's influence throughout BFTL, accompanied with Damon's tinge for a little future dance floor funk.

After receiving praise last year from luminaries such as Mary Ann Hobbs Damon's sound continues to gain in acclaim. 'Blues For The Libyan' will no doubt continue in that direction. We are very proud to present Damon's debut album here at Deepblak, and we hope that you enjoy.

FP-Oner aka Fred P - 5 (Mule Musiq)

Tracklist:1 in the mist of sunrise2 manifestations taking place3 the art of regeneration4 the law of correspondence5 the realm of possibility6 the otherness dub7 platinum soul8 visions of you9 infinite love10 cycles of life11 sleepless in shibuya

anyone who followed the development of house music made in the usa in the last decade will certainly have met the art of fred peterkin aka fred p aka black jazz consortium. the new york city native has been working on his very own music for almost 20 years, releasing some of the gentlest soul infiltrated four-to-the-floor house creations you can get.

his melting shuffling percussions with elementary melodies are done in such in a sense that the heavily used and abused phrase “deepness” finally gets a fresh truthful new meaning.

as a man who danced in his younger years in legendary nyc clubs like the red zone, sound factory or tunnel to dj sets of larger-than-life selectors like david morales, frankie knuckles or danny tenaglia, he learned that sometimes less is more. and that he should rather listen to his heart and soul, than the cacophony of the music market.

that is why you can call his house music journey music, music to travel to. sometimes it is an introspective and meditative journey; sometimes an inspirational and lively one. it always stays visionary while using simple codes to transform his inner voice into rhythms and melodies.

most of the eps and albums that he produced as fred p or black jazz consortium have been released via his very own label soul people music, now in operation for ten years. as fred p he also dropped 12inches on jus-ed’s underground quality as well as on toshiya kawasaki’s mule musiq label.

for the latter he now produced an album under the moniker of fp-oner, simply titled “5, the meaning of which the man from queens explains in the liner notes by himself. it is the start of a new trilogy that will lean more to the jazzier, relaxed and atmospheric side of his artistic deep house expressions.

as he adapts more from influences than technique, the album partly reminds of great smooth and exhilarating house moments from the past while heading straight into future. like always in fred p’s large œuvre all tracks are rooted in honesty - no chord, no groove, no tone is superficial. all eleven tracks thrive on mood – from sadness to sunshine.

the album starts with “in the mist of sunrise” – a track that seduces with a deep heavy bass-line, moony emotive chords and a hint of an improvised gentle piano melody. its followed by “manifestations taking place” – an emotive deep-jazz influenced track that could easily fit in his black jazz consortium body of work.

with “the art of regeneration” he pushes the dance floor beat for the first time. it is a simple sensation of a track, with an alien synth melody in the background, cool claps and soft seducing keys. thenceforth the longplayer oscillates between uplifting and smooth sensations, seducing with african percussions, serpentine melodies, jacking beats, emotive deep jazz moments, airy analogue chords, ethereal synths, tinkling keys, lounging soul vocals and dreamy atmospheres.

a groove-based introspection that he produced in berlin and up-road in hotel rooms between new york city and tokyo, it put all its elements together to the point in order to create elegant constructed house music that makes you feel entirely at ease.

as a tireless dj that is constantly on the road playing from berlin to rio and new york to tokyo, fred P has proved that he is one of the great spiritual house master builders of our time. “he who binds to himself a joy does the winged life destroy; but he who kisses the joy as it flies lives in eternity's sun rise”, the british poet william blake ones wrote. a poem that befits the art of fred p, as all his creations come to stay.

Curated by Lawrence, Carsten Jost, Bianca Heuser and Efdemin, the collection will also extend beyond the classy deep house the label is best known for, with tracks from friends of Dial such as Stefan Tcherepnin, James K, Physical Therapy and Dawn Mok exploring the further reaches of the label's diverse soundscape. White Material's DJ Richard also makes an appearance, with the compilation marking his Dial debut ahead of a full-length album on the label in September.

'All' will appear on CD and digital formats in addition to a three-part 12" vinyl release and will be supported by a Dial tour throughout 2015.

The idea for трип has been gestating for some time with Nina Kraviz, an avid crate-digger and frequenter of numerous second-hand record stores, who has long wanted to begin a label of her own which would build on some of the principles of her beloved 90s techno labels in terms of attitude and aesthetics, whilst looking for forward-thinking modern productions that reflect her core tastes for idiosyncratic electronic music.

The art and title of 'The Deviant Octopus' comes from a single-sentence scenario dreamt up by Kraviz: “Without a moment's notice an Octopus appeared and devoured everyone in sight”. Supplied with this scenario, artist Tombo rendered his own unique visualization for the artwork that adorns the release sleeve. It's Kraviz's own nod to the labels that inspire her and grab her attention while digging through second hand records, the best of which were imbued with the unique personality of the people behind them. This extends to the sound Kraviz intends for трип: dusky, divergent and trippy music to stimulate brains, dreams and fantasies.

In this respect ‘The Deviant Octopus’ is a perfect introduction: Kraviz herself is represented on the tracklist by two new tracks that take up the mantle of last year’s Mr Jones EP by returning to the vocal-flecked hypnotic techno that marked out that release. Complimenting those are two new cuts from a true master of hallucinatory off-kilter techno, Terrence Dixon in his Population One guise.

Joining them will be a pair of names from the techno pantheon who have been huge influences on Kraviz: with a career that’s taken in releases on Synewave, Trax, Novamute and Richie Hawtin’s early-90s Probe Records, Steve Stoll has been mining his own variant on techno and acid minimalism for over twenty years, heading up the Proper NYC label and releasing under various pseudonyms, such as Cobalt, of which Kraviz has been a long-term fan. His counterintuitively titled ‘Pop Song’ sits alongside a 13-minute 90s techno excursion from Reykjavik’s Exos - the only previously-released cut (originally appearing on Thule Records sub-label Plast Trax in 1998) - together illustrating that трип will also live up to its name in the geographical sense: showcasing great music from historically vibrant electronic music scenes outside of the usual Detroit-Berlin axis.

With Kraviz looking to build a small repertory of talent around трип, this first release also makes room for two newer names: Bjarki is an Icelandic talent to keep a firm eye on, who drew Kraviz’s attention in a chance meeting after a gig at Copenhagen’s Culturebox club, after which he passed her a collection of mind-bendingly odd demos; while Parrish Smith is a talented Netherlands-based producer whose short yet impactful sketch ‘1.0 / 8.0 Afrika Genocide’ brings the second 12” to a bewitching close.

Marco Shuttle will release his first solo album 'Visione' on his Eerie label in November. The Italian producer has made considerable waves in the techno scene over recent years, particularly since his breakthrough 2011 single The Vox Attitude. Having since released on Clone, The Bunker and Time To Express, this year has seen Shuttle hard at work at his first entry into the LP format.

The resulting album marks a more experimental Marco Shuttle than the one familiar from his singles. 'Visione' is a cohesive and compact work, which draws on Shuttle's design background to unfold an audio narrative with a strong aesthetic approach. With a more abstract sound than his club-focused records, 'Visione' retains a cinematic scope while maintaining a common texture of sound throughout the tracks: the detailed productions were created with mainly analogue equipment with meticulously modulated oscillators, creating tracks that are by turns psychedelic (In The Chaos), cosmic (The Way Out, Volts) and sinister (Beyond The Mass).

Opening track The Chaos... And Then... features a guest appearance from Donato Dozzy, with whom Shuttle recently unveiled the collaborative project Anxur, with a separate EP from the duo preceding the album on Eerie in October. That track aside, this is very much a personal statement from Shuttle who drew inspiration from Krautrock, 70's psychedelic electronica, musique concrete and norwegian avant garde jazz to mention just a few of the wide-ranging influences that have informed his Visione.

Session Victim - See You When You Get There (Delusions of Grandeur)

Tracklist: 1. Do It Now2. Hey Stranger3. Make People Dance4. See You When You Get There5. Never Forget6. Stick Together7. Hyuwee8. The Most Beautiful Divorce Ever9. Crystal Maze10. Under Your Spell11. Eos Place

Hamburg's Hauke Freer and Matthias Relling aka Session Victim return to Delusions of Grandeur with their second long player, 'See You When You Get There'.

Right from the start it's clear Session Victim's way with a groove hasn't diminished in the two years since their debut album, 2012's 'The Haunted House of House'. Do It Now and Hey Stranger open the record with the duo's trademark blend of subtle sampling, gloriously swinging beats and the same off-kilter sensibility that consistently raises them above their modern disco peers.

The new album marks a conscious progression in Freer & Relling's approach, evolving the sample-based production style that's won them plenty of fans since their emergence in 2008. Whereas their debut album was recorded in the duo's bedrooms, the new LP instead sees them embracing a full studio set-up, split between their own Hamburg-based studio and the fully-kitted out Room G studio in San Francisco.

Despite being situated in one of the USA's most beautiful locations, the duo found little time for anything outside the work at hand. Time not spent in the studio saw them raiding the two-dollar bins of Amoeba Music for interesting records to sample. "Having access to a fully-equipped studio was like hitting the jackpot. It was a bit intimidating too - we thought 'if we cannot write the LP here, it’s not in us'. A few days later we already forgot about this and were immersed in jamming and exploring," says Hauke. "We had access to all sorts of 80s drum machines, synths and fender rhodes of course that added another layer to the whole thing."

The resulting LP is as expected one that suits a variety of moods within SV's idiosyncratic range - from the dancefloor thrills of the piano-led Never Forget, the classic disco percussion & filtered guitar licks of Stick Together and the heads down groove of The Most Beautiful Divorce Ever to the more laid back jazz tempos of Hyuwee and Crystal Maze, while the record also has a place for the more oddball moments of Under Your Spell and Eos Place. 'See You When You Get There' finds Session Victim at their best yet, with an accomplished album that will likely emerge as one of 2014's strongest in its field.

Function / Vatican Shadow - Games Have Rules (Hospital Productions)

Tracklist:1. Things Known2. Things Unknown3. The Nemesis Flower4. A Year Has Passed5. A Year Has Gone By6. Red Opium7. Bejeweled Body

Function and Vatican Shadow have combined forces on 'Games Have Rules' for Hospital Productions, simultaneously stripping back each producer's more prevalent production elements - the dancefloor-focused techno structures of Function; the experimental cassette-roots of Vatican Shadow - to create an album of dynamic electronic ambient music, equal parts rhythmic and atmospheric.

As befitting what began life as an 'emotional acid' album best suited for an after-hours home listening experience, Games Have Rules was created in the early hours at New York's Hospital Productions and Berlin's Inanimate Objects studios, helping imbue the record with a sense of night turning into day, and the shifting contrasts of dark and light the music evokes.

Although not created as the result of improvisation the album retains an effortless, free-flowing structure, while simultaneously introducing the traditional techno drum kit over the course of the record, deconstructing the ever-changing, looming presence of New York City's skyline.

Ambient in the most traditional sense, Games Have Rules omits the top-heavy reverb saturation of so many modern releases and builds from the ground up with an arsenal hi-fi and lo-fi production techniques/equipment with a cinematic sequence over the arc of the record.

But whereas New York City has so often been depicted in film as a prison, Games Have Rules is an embracement of the city's endless possibilities: the LP's gatefold black and white image of The Empire State Building lit up at night from the inside; the ongoing stories of rise and decline lived out at it's base.

SHXCXCHCXSH - Linear S Decoded (Avian)

Tracklist:1. Entering The S-Cloud2. Drain This Lord3. Wading Guise4. The Roots5. Elocution6. Helical Dialog7. The Under Shore8. The Repelling Of The Quantitative Invasion9. A Sunny Day In Ostrogothia10. Rudimental Retreat 11. This Hmming Raverie12. Sub Mission - The Atlantic Vision13. Monolithic Conclusion

A year after their much-praised debut album STRGTHS, Avian's cryptic Swedish duo SHXCXCHCXSH are ready to present their second album, Linear S Decoded, this August. From elegiac opener Entering The S-Cloud, the intensity of tracks such as Elocution and Rudimental Retreat, and the disorienting beauty of Wading Guise and aptly-titled closer Monolithic Conclusion, the LP deftly broadens the scope of SHXCXCHCXSH's singular aesthetic.

Keeping their mystic aura always has been important to SHXCXCHCXSH - so important they didn’t want to take part in what they deemed 'the language game' until now. Their previous strict use of fragmented track titles illustrated an ideal of communication purely through music, to service the focus on sound via complete abstraction. Breaking the habit with Linear S Decoded doesn’t necessarily indicate a complete break with their approach, but an adjustment to the direction they have travelled since they first emerged two years ago.

As Resident Advisor identified in a perceptive review of the previous LP, among SHXCXCHCXSH's key strengths is the imbuing of their productions with a narrative sense, a sonic progression that moves beyond techno's standard repetition - it's an element of their work that's heightened further on Linear S Decoded, pulling focus from the more grinding, brutalistic elements of their distinct sound to reveal the more melodic, almost optimistic, elements that had previously remained in the shadows of the productions until now.

The track titles themselves are evocative about the new record whilst revealing few specifics: no less intriguing than the clustered consonants of the prior release titles, hinting at a deeper underlying narratives at play, possibly historically informed, or a fiction of the duo's own making. Either way, definitive answers will not be forthcoming: the mysteries that lay beneath SHXCXCHCXSH's approach to music making have long been an intrinsic part of their appeal. Linear S Decoded presents the opportunity for newcomers and those already au fait with the duo to employ their deciphering abilities, whilst simultaneously offering an expanded and ever more richly detailed landscape to traverse.

Deepblak Recordings owner AYBEE and label mainstay Afrikan Sciences offer up an homage to one of the greatest musical innovators of the 20th Century, Miles Davis. Sketches of Space is comprised of live jam session recordings spanning 3 years and two countries.

The project, though named after Mile's classic "Sketches of Spain", is not dedicated to any of Miles's work specifically, but honoring his pioneering spirit from which this project drew fuel, particularly Davis's spirit in his continual search for new sound. This search led him into the jazz fusion era, birthing a movement of stunning contributions by jazz giants that began to explore the improvisational possibilities of electronic instruments. This era in particular, along with its ethos, has played a critical role in Deepblak's creative direction over the years. AYBEE and Afsci have remained steadfast in pushing themselves sonically, and have drawn an innumerable amount of inspiration from the free flowing vibes of the 70's jazz fusion era.

Sketches of Space is by no means an out and out jazz album, nor is it a remix or recreation of Miles' music, but it is with him in mind that the two producers entered into the Sketches jam-sessions over two continents (Oakland, US / Berlin, DE), with the majority recorded live in neighborhood cafes. By turns wild, cosmic and smooth, Sketches represents the free flowing experimentation that Deepblak as a label cherishes so dearly.